An increasingly common problem for world travelers is access to banking and other transactions, such as stock purchases and bill payment while in other than their home countries. Many problems arise with these functions, including the need for identification information from the user to be inputted and transmitted to the local financial institution for authentication an approval by the user's home financial institution. As a result, a number of opportunities for error arise.
Another problem with international financial activities is the often close regulations of currencies by local governments, and the complications with transfers among differing currencies. These currency complications can include difficulty for the user in properly applying and verifying exchange rates.
In order to provide limited functionality, automatic teller machines (ATMs) allow access to funds in a network internationally for such functions as balance determinations, withdrawals, and fund transfers among accounts in the home country. However, these systems do not allow the user to conveniently transfer funds from an account in the home country to an account in the country the user is in or to other countries.
Another example of the present art is regional and country-specific terminals, such as customer access terminals (CATs) and personal computers, that allow banking and other transaction customers to access functions in that region or country. For example, a user in the United States accesses U.S. CAT applications. A user in Brazil accesses Brazilian CAT applications, and a user in Singapore accesses Singapore CAT applications.
However, existing systems only provide limited functions for users. Users generally can obtain only these limited balance determinations, withdrawals, and transfers, and generally, these functions may be performed only if the customer has an account with a cash balance to access. As a result, the traveling user has few functions the user can access. The user cannot perform more sophisticated functions typically available on the user's country-specific or regional CAT, such as directly buying stocks and paying bills.
Accordingly, there is a need to provide a more convenient and reliable system and method by which users can achieve a wide variety of financial, banking, and other transactional functions, particularly across international borders and in different currencies. There is a related need to enable the user to perform these functions in an easily understood manner.